The former boss of Club Marconi, Tony Zappia, has been fined and banned from office for a year after an inquiry found he had engaged in “deliberate dishonest and fraudulent conduct”.
A Herald investigation in 2021 revealed that Zappia, the club’s CEO, had authorised the payment of a fraudulent invoice submitted by a convicted fraudster.
The $13,750 invoice was paid into the account of Zappia’s friend, Brendan Gaffney.
Gaffney, an ex-bankrupt former Westpac bank manager, was jailed for five years in 2007 for stealing almost $4 million from clients to gamble on horses, including placing bets “on credit” for “high-profile” people to curry favour.
In May 2020, Zappia’s family acquired shares in a company run by Gaffney. The fraudulent invoice, for work never done, was to pay for Zappia’s shares.
Zappia, 61, was fired from the Bossley Park club in February 2021 when the fraudulent invoice came to light.
A subsequent investigation by the Independent Liquor & Gaming Authority found that the fake invoice issued by Rentfleet for “relocation of machinery” had been created at Zappia’s request. However, on Thursday, the authority found that Rentfleet knew nothing about the invoice and that the money instead went to an account belonging to a Rentfleet staffer.
While ILGA did not refer to Gaffney by name, it has previously reported that Gaffney was fired from Rentfleet following the Herald’s story.
ILGA’s investigation found that the club’s funds of $13,750 went from Gaffney’s account into Zappia’s personal bank account later that same day.
Following Zappia’s dismissal, he received a payout in excess of $306,000. He later repaid the $13,750.
Zappia had submitted to ILGA that the payment was “clumsy” and that his “situation was driven by unique external pressures unlikely to recur”.
He also submitted that any monetary penalty imposed should be modest and that he should be allowed to pay in instalments. Zappia said that due to current health issues, he was unable to work and was receiving a “monthly total disability benefit of around $11,000 under his income protection policy.”
However, ILGA’s findings were that Zappia had “engaged in deliberate dishonest and fraudulent conduct by causing a fraudulent invoice to be issued and paid by the Club”.
Zappia was slapped with a 12-month ban because he lacked “the requisite honesty, integrity and ethical standards required to be considered a fit and proper person to be the secretary or a member of the governing body of a club.”
He was also fined $11,000 and ordered to pay almost $13,000 in costs.
Although Zappia submitted to the inquiry that he was of previous good character, the fraudulent invoice was not Zappia’s only questionable conduct.
A previous Herald investigation revealed Zappia, who was fired as chief executive of Cronulla Sharks in 2009 for punching a female employee in the face, had failed to declare that a sporting apparel company owned by his wife, his sister and brother-in-law had received tens of thousands of dollars from the rugby league club.
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